9 New Subjects
by Sky5372
Summary: Warpers, you could say that there's more to them then meets the eye. But by the time your eyes have met, they're already gone
1. Something different

**AN: Subnautica is not owned by me, but by Unknown Games. The clue's in the website name**

 **I could kinda do with a Beta Reader to help fix my potato twelve year old punctuation, so if anybody could volunteer it'd be greatly appreciated  
**

* * *

A single clean slice through the body was all it took. Two halves of a shark fell to the ground in a cloud of yellow blood, green spots dotting the hard outer shell of the fauna.

 **"** **Compromised subject 10342 neutralised,"** Xelicic hissed, the various clicks and stutters making up his speech being near instantaneously transferred to both the A and B class Quarantine Enforcers that were operational on the planet. And with that update the automated part of his mind went dormant, and Xelicic was finally able to give his blades a stretch.

"Oh, Creator above, that lasted way too long," the enforcer unit muttered to himself, effortlessly accessing the part of him that was added as if it was just another limb, crossing his arms, collapsing out of existence with a flash of teal and purple and reappearing in what they'd dubbed the 'Wide dunes'. Looking out, you could see nothing but rolling hills of sand and rocks for almost a kilometre, along with the three resident Leviathans that had made that area their hunting ground. Beautiful in both the imperfection of the various rocky outcrops scattered randomly across the biome and in the perfection of the dunes and creatures that roamed it. So, in Xelicic's eyes, one of the best places on the planet.

Making a small shift to the wavelength of his telepathy to make it exclusive to one of his closest friends, Xelicic's speech suddenly shifted from the higher pitched and faster natural speech to the low, grating and robotic voice that made up the faraway speech of his kind.

 **"** **Hey, Mela? You out of it yet? I'm up at the Wide Dunes."** He broadcasted to her, the questioning tone indistinguishable in the monotone voice that came from their telepathy.

A second later a reply came through, the echoing voice of his friend resonating to him from seemingly nowhere- **"Yeah, the B classes have kept the infected to a minimum."** A few of her screeches dropped down even further in pitch, the equivalent to a human mutter, **"Bloody monospeakers."** Melatisma burst into existence in front of him, already preoccupied with trying to scrape off a few small shards of Kyanite which had managed to get themselves embedded in her left blade.

"Yeah, I don't like them either. But they do their job, and it means that we barely have to do anything. The less I'm in Hunting mode, the better, if you ask me." Xelicic sighed, swimming forwards to help skim off the chunks of crystal. The things were a nightmare to get out by yourself, due to the fact that you'd have to dig every single one out with the tip of your blade, as well as the self-healing being bad (for once), due to how hard it was to lever a chunk of Kyanite out of your arm with the skin constantly regrowing. Because of this, it was natural courtesy for Enforcers to help each other out, had they been down into the lavacaves. Or at least, among the A classes. The B classes don't really have the creative capacity to imagine doing something like cleaning their blades.

Melatisma flicked her two back tentacles in a shrug, looking out into the mushroom forest where another Enforcer, practically identical to them, had popped into view and nearly immediately dove after a boomerang with a smattering of green spots. A single slice was executed and the B class immediately snapped back to his patrol path, phasing back out of sight in a ball of teal. "Is it just me, or is the infection getting worse? I was Hunting for something like an hour earlier in the Great Reef, which I'm pretty sure isn't meant to happen more than once a month, on average," she said, a pained look barely visible in her eyes. With just a single phase of Hunting mode that long, at least thirty, if not fifty, creatures had lost their life early. Xelicic still told himself that they were helping, that a few slices were a far better fate then slow liver and lung failure. But, well, it's not like he had a say in the matter. The reason exactly why his memory suddenly cut out then came back in, with nothing but a few data logs stored in that part of his mind added by his Creator, was still unbeknownst to him. It was _something_ to do with the green disease; Xelicic knew that much, but not much more.

"Half an hour here," Xelicic replied, beginning to swim forwards and making a sudden warp half-kilometre forwards, into what could be called the centre of the Wide Dunes. Melatisma followed at exactly the same pace, with both of them floating down to rest on the sandy floor. "Whatever is stopping the Kharaa killing this planet altogether, it's starting to weaken. And have you managed to figure out the Watcher problem yet? I followed one for ages at the mountain, and did the same thing you said they did to you. It dove over a ledge near the sea floor, I followed it, and the thing had just disappeared. So then I thought it had gone further around the mountain, so I kept going and just… Warped. Like, as if you suddenly got really bored and decided to go someplace else. Have you ever felt something like that?" This was the first time Xelicic had voiced these concerns to his friend, and although her blades tilted inwards in a worried stance, she still attempted to laugh it off.

"That sounds ridiculous. Last time I checked, Watchers can't warp, and I can't remember anything being on the other side of the mountain anyway. That's the B classes' patrol zone; there isn't exactly much use in going there," she smirked, flicking her right blade and launching a small, harmless orb at Xelicic.

Teleporting away in the few moments before impact, the orb splattered against the sand and he reappeared behind Melatisma, an orb of his own already flying through the water towards her, and another to his right. She easily avoided the first, imploding into nothing to appear right in front of the second. The ball connected solidly with her chest and an explosion of white and teal came with it, similar to the way that Enforcers warped, but collapsing into the orb as opposed to into their 'Heart'. Melatisma appeared right underneath blade that shot the offending projectile, which was positioned right below the two sacks on the back of her head.

"You surrender?" Xelicic laughed playfully, two of his eyes closed and his free blade curled upwards in a grin.

Melatisma slowly started to curve her blades inwards whilst pretending to think about it, until she was practically hugging Xelicic, before suddenly warping behind him with her blades now crossed around his chest. "Nah, I'll pass. I have a better idea," she retorted, bringing her arms back in a big show of being about to slice him across the belly. This, of course, gave him ample time to teleport away and immediately go back on the offense. The rhythm of the spar was almost hypnotic, as both were constantly slashing and parrying each other, warping to different angles to try and get a better shot at the other and to dodge each other's attacks, both shooting an orb at random points trying to catch the other off guard

Although the orbs were intended for combat purposes, class A Enforcers have the ability to fire two different forms, which came in quite useful. The ones used that they defaulted to whilst Hunting were the 'Summoning' orbs. These were larger, and designed to hurt as much as a projectile like that could. Getting hit by one was about the same as being whacked in the head by a falling rock, to try and leave the target disorientated at the point of teleporting right below an Enforcer's blades. What gave them their name, however, was the ability to pull any sort of aggressive Fauna from the nearby area (most of the time it was limited to the biome they were in) and straight to the Enforcer to assist them in combat. The second, 'Relocation' orbs are smaller, less disruptive and damaging versions of the combat-intended variants. They had various uses, but weren't used all that much alone when it was simply easier to warp to whatever you needed. So most of their use, or at least by Xelicic, was in situations like these

Eventually both got tired, as whatever stream of energy that kept them going may have been more than enough to allow them to go about their lives and routines without issue, but a spar like this would drain them in a matter of minutes. Both of them warped to a small cave underneath an outcrop of rock in the Wide Dunes, which they'd decided to call their 'home' a while ago. Territory, home, nest, whatever you wanted to call it, that's what they chose.

Although the artificial part of his mind stopped him from staying in one place without seeing other Fauna for around an hour (Xelicic didn't really know the reasoning behind this. Maybe to get him Hunting more?), this is where they'd stay to rest, and just as something to hang onto. No matter what the other part of his mind said, he still needed somewhere to default to, instead of just forever wandering the world, which became quite small after around ten years. The cave was relatively plain, with only a thick net of stinging vines at the doorway placed to stop other creatures getting inside, and two Royal Coral that they'd nurtured for around two years growing in a patch of sand in the back. A few other Flora had sprung up on the walls, giving the cave a bit more life, but there were no 'decorations', so to speak. No diamond, no gold, no aluminium oxide, as opposed to a few of the Shockers and Ghost Juveniles he knew, who liked nothing better than embedding those shiny rocks in the entrance and ceiling to give it some more 'Flair'. But Xelicic was happy with what they'd made

After a half-hour of lying on the ground and loosing himself in his thoughts and worries, a familiar roar snapped him out of his daydream and, warping to where the sound originated, he saw an equally familiar mandibled face.

"Caloros. Nice to see you." The Reaper Leviathan whose territory they happened to have occupied ran a quick loop around Xelicic, managing to seem both menacing and passive simultaneously. How does something that big manage to still run nearly perfect circles around him- something about as big as the mandibles on his mouth? Xelicic still didn't know, but it was a sight to behold nonetheless

"Huh, you're still hanging around. I thought your kind didn't stay put for very long." Caloros growled, giving Xelicic a swat with his tail whilst making a dash forwards.

"You've said that to me every day since I came in here, you know that?" Xelicic retorted, teleporting up next to the beast's head. Two years back he'd decided to start teaching Caloros their language, and it didn't go all that badly. Well, as easily as teaching something with a brain the size of a Watcher and a near non-existent short term memory a whole new language can go. It was admittedly made easier because of Xelicic's universal translator, turning the whole thing into a one-sided process. But, well… Speaking with a creature that had no morals or empathy could get pretty cold after a while, which was mostly the reason that their talks were only a few sentences, if not a passing comment.

Expressions were not something Xelicic's translator helped with, but if he had to guess he'd say that the leviathan was looking confused.

"I have? Well, I said it again. If you have an issue with that, you can tell it to the back of my jaw." This was a hollow threat, and they both knew it. Well, maybe Caloros didn't, but Xel definitely did. As the Reaper discovered when they first met, he was near impervious to anything Caloros could throw his way, should that be teeth or claw. What he could do is break down their cave, which he had the full right to. They were infringing on his hunting ground, after all

Letting out an exasperated sigh (although Caloros wouldn't know it), Xelicic yielded. "Okay, fine. I'll leave now. Happy?" and warping away before he could get a word in edgewise

Returning back to their nest, Xelicic found that Melatisma had left and been replaced by another Enforcer entirely, an A class of course. Volain looked like she'd been run over by several consecutive boulders, barely able to lift an arm and click a few half-hearted words of greeting before sprawling back down onto the sand. "What happened?"? Xelicic enquired, to which the other Enforcer could only let out a long, quiet screech of guilt, and he immediately knew what the answer to his question was. "Oh my … I'm so sorry. I didn't realise another Goliath juvenile was infected already."

"Was. Past tense. Nothing more…" Volain whispered, her voice shaking more than he'd ever heard it before. She was speaking so out of character, all confidence completely gone, that he didn't know what to do. Xelicic just had to hope for something to take her mind off the murder that took place.

Settling down next to her, Xel began gently stroking the back of Volain's cloak with the flat of his blades in an attempt to calm her, although he almost felt like doing the same. Goliath eggs were only laid once every five years, with another years' incubation. However, their immunity to the green disease seemed to only kick in once they hit adulthood. And on the tragic occasion that they do catch the infection… There's nothing that the Enforcers can do to stop themselves.

After around ten minutes, Volain had regained enough energy that she felt she needed to explain to the parents of the Goliath what happened. She still feels partially to blame despite her lack of control, and said she couldn't let the guilt settle with her anymore. Again, everything she was saying was so out of character for her, and Xel had to simply hope that she'd be back to her normal by the end of her next Hunting phase. He wasn't planning on coming for the extremely awkward conversation, mostly because he knew how it felt. Xelicic had his own encounter around three years ago, and although he'd gotten over it by now, the memories of grief still stayed with him. And this wasn't exclusive to the Goliaths either. He'd had similar encounters with just about every sentient creature on this planet, ending the lives of betrothed, juveniles, parents, and in certain cases, even whole clutches of eggs. And through all of this, he had no ability to stop it.

Xelicic thought he'd got over these feelings of helplessness a long time ago, but apparently the death of another sentient child by an A class was enough to bring them all back. And whilst he was floating perfectly still, these memories coming back to him, Volain had disappeared into nothingness.

He breached the surface of the water, having warped back upwards, and just stayed there. The wind was surprisingly strong due to the amount of water vapour in the air, and Xelicic could already feel the water flying off the top of his arms. He'd always wondered what it'd be like to swim up there in the , away from all the fears and worries in the undersea world he was bound to . It was at that point that he heard the sound of a siren shrieking in the distance

A loud hum began to resonate through the air, slowly increasing in intensity until the water around Xelicic was visibly shaking. And not only was it coming from the ground, a different frequency was also stemming from the Space, appearing as a tiny white dot among the clouds slowly getting closer. And suddenly the resonance of the two became one, striking both the water around him into a frenzy and striking into _him_ , letting out a screech of exactly the same pitch. All at once the sound cut out, leaving the ocean quiet as a pure green beam arced straight into the white dot, space itself seeming to bend inwards on impact before pulsing outwards in a ring of pure heat. The now white and red dot was starting to drop at a surprising rate, revealing itself to be a Space-Swimmer after it had dropped for another minute. And it was this small detail that snapped Xelicic out of the trance he had been held in watching this. The Space-Swimmer was aimed to land directly at his location, and something that large was sure to wipe out everything around it

 **"** **All deactivated A class Enforcers, Summon as many Fauna as possible from the Wide Dunes, then Warp out all Megafauna from the biome once all non-megafauna are safe. Take immediate action,"** he clicked frantically, warping into the Mushroom forest and immediately sending out as many Summoner orbs as possible, all whilst constantly glancing at the Space to check how close the Swimmer was to impact. At the point where the last Sand Shark had left the portal, various other reports were coming through from the other deactivated Enforcers

 **"** **All standard Fauna evacuated. Securing leviathan No.2 and all Shockers in location momentarily,"** came the voice of Zcille, presumably deactivated only recently

 **"** **I got all the small fry, and Carolos is already in the Mountains. Couldn't find any Shockers though, I'm relying on you for those, Xeli,"** Volain responded, back to her old self (for now, at least)

 **"** **Understood. Searching my area now,"** "Xeli"'s slightly strained voice came through, immediately starting to rapidly warping around the now uncomfortably warm Wide Dunes searching for any remaining creatures. He'd come across seven Shockers before finding the leviathan, each electrified snake having a series of questions which he could only answer with a click and a quick personal warp to the Mushroom forest. Xelicic was sure they could orientate themselves after that. The leviathan, however, was not so easy to land a shot on. He had never met this one outside of random encounters, and so had not taught it his language.

Eventually Xelicic managed to warp to the head of the creature, screech a few _select_ words in the most forceful way possible, and warp it over to the Mountains. Now that all creatures had been moved, he warped over to the surface of the forest and there, joint by another Enforcer and three Shockers, they watched the Space-Swimmer sink below the clouds, shooting out around nine small white pods before coming into contact with the extra oxygen, and exploding in a ball of flame

* * *

 **This is my first attempt at a fanfiction, so please feel free to leave a review and tell me what you think. Feedback helps me a lot**


	2. Encounters

**AN: Subnautica is owned by Unknown Games, not me.**

 **Huge thanks to Coincidencless for beta reading this thing!**

* * *

Running down the corridor as fast as possible, Kaisa quickly grabbed the ladder of a hatch in the floor and slid down into the escape pod marked '5', sitting in the chair attached to the side and hitting the escape button. The harness descended, the clear female voice of his PDA calmly started a three second countdown and a loud hiss rang across the pod from the propulsion gas built into the launch mechanism. His eyes wide with fear, Kaisa watched the lifepod fall away from his home of the last sixteen months, just as the two rear engines exploded in a ball of flame.

As fearful as he was, Kaisa still couldn't shake off how surreal the whole thing felt, like it might as well have been some sort of nightmare. So when the G-force, not unlike the ones he'd experienced whilst going through a phasegate, managed to detach one of the metal panels and a fire extinguisher attached to the side of the pod, he made no attempt to stop the panel hitting him dead in the head.

He awoke later, fully convinced that what he remembered from earlier was simply a dream. The short-lived relief was gone the second he smelt the smoke.

He frantically tapped at the release button on the side of his harness, and eventually resorted to slamming his fist down on the thing. Kaisa's harness slid upwards, allowing him to turn his attention to how bad his situation was; specifically, the fact that he was in an enclosed space with a fire taking up the other half of the pod. However, in a stroke of luck, the fire extinguisher had slipped downwards until it was right next to his chair as opposed to in the centre of the fire. The air purifiers were working overtime at this point to try and ensure that he didn't asphyxiate inside his pod anytime soon, but even this kind of tech couldn't work forever, so he had to do what he did quickly.

Quickly flexing as many digits as possible to ensure nothing broke on the way down, Kaisa pushed himself out of the chair and snatched up the fire extinguisher, and after he was sure that nothing had leaked, directed the stream of sub-zero foam at the blaze. Once he was sure that all of the flames were gone from the electronics he replaced the canister, and looked upwards. Through the glass hatch he could only see a mix of blue and white, the sun situated somewhere to the left of his pod. The sky did look a lot like the pictures of Earth he'd seen, but that still couldn't confirm that the air wasn't some sulphur-based gas that would kill him.

A faint screech could be heard outside the airtight seal of the pod, and a sudden flash of black above him signalled the head of a strange fauna coming into view, peering into the glass. The creature walked a bit farther over the hatch so that he could see its belly; it had two deep blue spots near the head with a small black patch further down, looking almost like a smile. It struck Kaisa as strangely cheerful, but more importantly, it confirmed his assumptions that the air outside was safe to breathe, at least in his eyes.

Climbing the rungs of the central ladder, Kaisa pushed open the top hatch, prompting the small creature to fly upwards and hover in front of his head for a second as he emerged, before flying away into the distance. As he looked around at the endless expanse of water, the Aurora with its burning engines and exhaust fumes came into view and his breath caught in his throat.

"Oh my God…"

The emptiness of it all seemed to give both a sense of wonder, and gut-wrenching fear. Kaisa's skin went cold as he took in the predicament he was in. A massive ocean planet, water as far as the distant mist would let him see, and nobody to accompany him. Sliding back down the ladder he sat back down in his chair, head in his hands, for an indefinite amount of time; he didn't know. A short, sharp shock distracted him from the thoughts, making him look downwards at his pocket.

The PDA! He'd completely forgotten about the thing until now, but it was coded to boot in some sort of 'emergency mode', in order to ensure his survival on an alien planet. Exactly the situation he was in now.

Pulling the sheet of plastic from his pocket, shying away from the sparks near the border between the handle and electronics, Kaisa tapped the screen, causing a flash with each tap until the screen showed a loading bar, an eerily cheerful Alterra jingle paired with it. Once it had finished loading and reading out the current priorities, he quickly skimmed through the reports given to him, finally putting it away and trying to build up the courage to descend through the hatch below him.

* * *

Xelicic had found another. A large symbol which his translator read as the number three was written on the front of it and unlike the other he had found, which had already had the number seventeen ripped in half by a bulbsnake, this one was fully intact. Not only that, but there were sounds coming from inside, and although the speech was muffled by the shell around the pod so that the translator could only pick up a few words, he heard something about a rendezvous and leaving the planet. It sounded interesting, but unlikely. Their Space-Swimmer was gone, and they definitely didn't come from this place, so whatever they were promising to each other was clearly a false hope, or maybe just a simple mistake.

A small amount of time passed, with Xelicic absentmindedly warping seeds from the nearby clusters to slice into as many pieces as he could whilst listening to the few words of their conversation. Eventually they said something about going outside, that particular phrase a lot closer due to the creature's proximity to whatever was blocking the sound. A pop and the sound of water rushing into a small space could be heard somewhere within the strange pod, the top of it flipped open, and the two fauna swam out.

They had a very strange shape, the two fins on their upper arms seeming extremely inefficient for moving through water, and lower arms appearing more suited to moving around on the top of a rock, in the same way a rockcrawler would. They also appeared to have two skins; the second, pink one was covered up on every part apart from the head by a thicker, black and orange skin. Xelicic, hidden by the kelp around him, watched the two fauna desperately wave their limbs around in an attempt to propel themselves towards… Something? Perhaps they were simply testing their ability to swim, although it seemed like an awful waste of stamina and energy in Xeli's opinion.

They seemed to be getting the hang of it by now, moving at around the same pace as a watcher by this point, albeit a little more clumsily. One of them had pulled out a large chunk of swimmer, moulded into a very strange cylindrical shape. Small shots of shocker energy jumped off it at random points, though the creatures didn't seem relatively fazed by it. Perhaps it was a weaker variation? Or it could be more like the power of the paralysis crabs, which again, seemed quite unlikely considering the colour and shape of the sparks. He'd eventually decided on something like the former idea whilst watching the other jab a much smaller piece of swimmer, barely the size of their tiny arms, at the larger chunk, removing numerous sparks that were flying off it.

Xelicic, swimming forward to get a closer look, had clearly enacted a response from one of them. Waving a flipper in his direction, he squeaked 'What is that thing?' while the other simply floated motionlessly, the secondary layer of skin growing significantly paler than it already was. Closing his two top eyes, Xeli chopped his left blade downwards in greetings, accidentally slicing straight through the branch of kelp below him while doing so. Swimming closer to them, it was only then that he was able to appreciate how small they were. A single one of them was barely larger than a single one of his blades, and he was about double their size overall. One of them squeaked a word which he couldn't translate, but both of them immediately started to swim away from him, at which point he realised something.

The smile faded, to be replaced with a single eye closed in sadness. Both of these creatures had started to show traces of the green illness, and although it wasn't enough to start him Hunting, he knew it could only get worse. Apparently neither of their skins could stop the disease sinking through to their bodies, and it would be a blessing to kill them now rather than let them live the five weeks of life they had left. Xelicic warped straight in front of the two, the pod right below them.

"I'm so sorry. It would be better for me to do this now then for you to live, I promise," Xelicic said sadly, prompting the fauna to become even more frantic then before, pulling on the top of the pod and sliding straight down, disappearing from sight. They obviously couldn't understand anything that he said, so maybe his voice alone was enough to make them run? He didn't completely understand, but that didn't really matter at this point.

Xelicic sighed, swinging a blade into the side of their shell. It slid straight through like a Lava Queen through rock, the resulting slit showing the two huddled on the other side of the pod. Bringing his other blade in, he easily sliced a hole through the side and Xelicic poked his upper body in. His cloak protected him from the sharp edges, his tentacles flicking themselves outside the pod whilst he bore down on the two inside the metal shell. Both of them were pressed against the far wall, screaming 'Please don't kill me! Please!' and desperately trying to find a way out. Xelicic was used to it. It was always the same song, same dance and the same finish. He bowed his head in sorrow and swung his blades, cleaving both through the waist with a single swipe. Setting off in the direction of the Mushroom Forest, he erratically warped forward around twenty metres at random points. This was a way of travel he'd picked up a while ago from a friend, allowing him to get to where he needed to be quickly enough when not in a rush, without sacrificing the chance of seeing something that might catch his interest along the way. And wouldn't you know it, something managed to do exactly that.

The 'something' in question was another one of those creatures, which had just dove down into a cave system. Knowing better than to be spotted again immediately, Xelicic opted to wait behind a net of stinging vines nearby, his purple body blending in nearly perfectly with them. A minute or so later the creature swam upwards again, getting apparently distracted and veering over to a location just to the left of Xeli's hiding spot. A crack resonated through the caves below him and a piece of copper fell down to the ground, the fauna swimming down to pick it up and put it… somewhere? It seemed to just disappear, so he guessed they either had another piece of technology he hadn't heard of, or something akin to his own warping. Most probably the former.

The creature seemed satisfied and started its floppy swim back to their own pod, attached to the surface instead of sitting on the ground like the last one he'd seen. Once it had entered through a hole in the bottom of the pod, Xelicic listened to a few crashes as the materials were set down, a small hum as something worked inside of the pod, and finally a victorious 'Yes!' from within. A different sound started up, the same as the one made by the tool being used on the cylinder the other creatures had with them, and then a click from somewhere within. Lights came on inside the shell, peeking through the bottom hole, and a beeping started up from somewhere else.

Xeli listened with curiosity as a voice started up in a room, but his heart quickly sank as he heard what it was. The voice of the fauna he had just killed played back through whatever was inside the pod. All interest gone, Xelicic turned away from the pod to make a quick broadcast.

 **"** **Class B command broadcast, nine new biological subjects designated. On contact, engage Mode: Hunting. Sharing subject location with other agents."** He sent a small data package with the locations of all the pods he had currently found along with the transmission, and was already getting updates from other Class A agents about the locations. The ones within the B patrol routes would be ignored by Xelicic's kind, who would instead focus on the others, who would inevitably develop an infection at whatever point. He was still going to hold off until the scanners picked up an anomaly, simply due to the fact that there was no point ending a life when there was no reason to. Even if it was going to inevitably happen, Xelicic still viewed it as murder without a reason.

He began to swim off, paying no attention to the beeping that had started up again, but froze the second he heard his own raspy voice coming from the pod. Instantaneously warping to the side of the pod once again to listen, he listened to a partially translated copy of the broadcast he had just made. A bad translation, admittedly, with several words in the wrong place and some not translated at all, but the effect on the creature inside was still the same. A scream rang out through the air, but only for a second. All that could be heard was the sound of rapid, heavy breathing, and then a thump on the ground. After that? Nothing.

* * *

 **Again, feel free to leave your thoughts in a review. Feedback helps me quite a bit.**


	3. Changed

**AN: Sorry for the wait! This chapter is shorter than most, I'm still trying to get back into the swing of writing after leaving it for 5 months. Again, huge thanks to Coincidencless for Beta-Reading!**

* * *

Kaisa slowly came to, lying on the floor of the escape pod. The mental fog slowly clearing, he suddenly flinched back from the radio in front of him. That _sound_ , the grating robotic screeches. And whatever that thing said, about 'new subjects' and 'hunting', was quite evidently targeted towards him.

Pulling himself up to the chair, a soft blip coming from his PDA distracted him from his thoughts. Giving the device a quick swipe revealed a full transcript of the message, complete with garbled text and all, serving only to further prove his suspicions. Mustering his courage, Kaisa gingerly peered through the porthole attached to the underside of the pod. He was positive that he saw a flash of purple beneath him, but upon closer inspection, whatever it was had disappeared. Simply putting it down to paranoia from the transmission, Kaisa once again pulled open the hatch and dove down into the depths.

According to his fabricator, he required a sheet of silicon rubber to create a knife, which in turn required a few Creepvine Seed Clusters. A simple sweep of the eyes revealed said clusters within some sort of kelp forest. As he neared the tangle of vines an inhuman growling slowly became audible, increasing in volume the closer he swam.

He pulled as many seeds as he could fit in his storage from the vine and then turned to swim back to the pod. As he did so, something purple shot from the kelp behind him, its teeth ripping cleanly through the side of his arm and releasing a cloud of blood. Kaisa released a muffled scream, sending a kick that landed solidly on the head of the long-nosed creature in his panic. Something shiny flew out of its mouth and lodged itself in the sand, but he paid no heed to that. All he cared about was getting away as quickly as his suit allowed.

Kaisa frantically swam away, the thing seemingly reluctant to leave the safety of the kelp. Once back at the pod he pulled a medkit from the respective station and applied the bandages held inside, the chemicals contained on top immediately setting to work. Letting out a sigh of relief as the fluid congealed over the wound and the anesthetic kicked in, he was also happy to see that the suit itself had self-repaired as expected, albeit slower than what he was comfortable with. What really mattered was the knife. Even this most basic of weapons gave him some form of comfort, or the idea of an ounce of control, or just _something_ familiar. He never realized how much he needed something he recognized, something from his past life.

Once his arm was recovered sufficiently to be used for swimming once again, Kaisa ventured out once more in search of materials for a battery. These were surprisingly easy to get, so he had a scanner in no time. From there, a whole plethora of information was opened to him. Almost everything he could see had something about them to be told, Flora and Fauna alike. The one-eyed fish were called 'Peepers', and were edible. As were Boomerang fish and Bladderfish could be used to make filtered water. Garyfish were salty, Hoverfish were chewy, Rays were poisonous. The facts may not have been good, but they were useful. Kaisa's survival began to seem just that bit more likely

* * *

Xelicic was relieved when he heard movement from the bulb once again. The thought that he had managed to scare the creature to death had only recently occurred to him, and thankfully never came to be. Seeing it approach the bubble on the underside of the bulb, his instincts kicked in and he near instantly warped away to the kelp forest and from there, the mushroom forest. Here he was greeted by around three Shockers, circling him in a slightly fearful manner until one of them asked, "Are you the living one?"

He rolled all four eyes, promptly dismissing their concerns by actually providing a reply, as opposed to the response his lesser counterparts would give. "Yes, I'm the living one. I'm not going to kill any of you." This was a question he was commonly asked by the sapient species, as there wasn't exactly an outside factor to differentiate Enforcers from each other apart from size, and even that was a stretch.

They all visibly relaxed, the circling ceasing and the patterns flashing across their prongs slowing down. Xelicic would have greeted them if he was able to, but names weren't exactly easy when they consisted purely of patterns of lights. Questions flashed across the prongs of all three Fauna. "What… What happened to the Wide Dunes? What is the Space-Swimmer doing in the water? Why is it bigger than the first one? Xeli, we want answers."

Xelicic shrugged, responding with an honest answer. "I don't know. It did something to the Wide Dunes; I don't know what. Just, stay away from it. I don't know what it's done, but I can't risk it being something similar to the green illness." All three of the Shockers grudgingly agreed, the risk overcoming natural curiosity for now.

Once they felt that all their questions had been answered, the Shockers quickly lost interest in Xelicic and began the swim back to their respective territories. With almost perfect timing, Melatisma burst into existence with a panicked look in her eyes. "Xeli, the… the swimmer landed on…" Her voice cut out suddenly with a shudder, both tentacles whipping the water into a frenzy in her upset.

Xelicic swam forwards and rested his blade on hers in an attempt to calm her. "Mel, just slow down. Tell me what you saw." He clicked in a soft tone. Seeing Melatisma this distraught was incredibly rare; even after some of the most brutal periods of Hunting he'd ever experienced. She was always calm, always collected. None of those words described the creature in front of him.

She released a shrill screech of distress, barely managing to say between all the clicks and screeches "Just… Look," before warping away. Xelicic followed, suddenly freezing in place as he looked upon what was in front of him. Where his home used to sit, where he and Meli had spent countless hours together, the place he had spent so long nurturing, was gone. Obliterated, crushed by the hunk of metal stretching towards the horizon. The Wide Dunes was completely wiped out, the occasional rise in sand was the only indicator of what the biome used to be. Pieces of metal scattered the area, with far larger chunks of the Swimmer seemingly broken off and lying around the dunes.

A look at the faces of both Warpers would have shown only pain. Looking to each other, they gently embraced one's head on the shoulder of the other, their arms wrapped around each other and blades lying flat on the other's cloak.

"Meli, it's okay, we can get past this. We just have to learn to live with it," Xelicic clicked quietly to her

"I know. It's just that - "Melatisma's voice cut out in a sob. Intertwining tentacles, they slowly sank to the seabed where they stayed, grieving for the memories and home they had lost.

* * *

 **Again, please feel free to leave a review with your opinions. They all help!**


	4. Progression

**AN: Sorry this took so long! Again, huge thanks to Coincidencless for beta reading**

* * *

The transmission had led him to what he assumed was the right pod, with a bold number 3 painted onto the side. Although the SOS was only made around half an hour ago, his hope of meeting someone else quickly disappeared at the sight of the hole ripped into the side. Peering in closer, his eyes widened. He'd found the two crew members, in two pieces. Something had sliced them almost perfectly in half, with inhuman precision. No creature could do anything like this, nor any person he'd ever met. However, there was something lying next to the bodies which his PDA read as scannable, so Kaisa closed his eyes and swam closer, holding down the trigger and praying that it managed to read the fragment. A short blip informed him of his success, and Kaisa turned to return home and see what the fragment had added. But a blue glow from within the lifepod caught his eye, prompting him to look back into the ripped hole.

There sat an abandoned PDA, presumably left there before the occupants got chopped in half. Curiosity and a sort of obligation lead him back inside and his own PDA informed him that a data dump could be made from a nearby device. He accepted. Two new items flashed up on his screen: A log for the crew, and a data bundle for a basic compass, both of which Kaisa planned to review back at his lifepod.

During his swim back, the shock from seeing the corpses was only just starting to set in. What kind of creature could do that? If they could think, why would they do such a thing to a group of harmless people? Were they human? Were they looking for him?

Kaisa shook his head, trying to dismiss the thoughts. They were only going to weight him down, and that was the last thing he needed right now.

Back in the safety of the lifepod, he took the time to look over everything he'd gathered on his journey. Although he'd managed to gather a few useful materials, along with the compass blueprints, the trip had left a bad taste in his mouth. He may have not known those people, but nobody deserves that kind of death.

Whilst he was scanning through the data logs given to him by the PDA, mostly on the surrounding landscape, a small warning flashed up on the edge of his vision, alternating between a picture of an apple and a meter showing 30%.

Shit. Kaisa had completely forgotten about his need for food, focused as he was on getting resources. Speaking of which, what could he eat? Sure, this planet had plenty of fish, but none of the plants he'd scanned had been listed as 'edible', nor did he have a fire to cook said fish.

Switching the PDA menu to the blueprints, Kaisa flicked through them searching for some sort of tool to cook with, when he came to a section listed as "cooking". Opening it up revealed a list of the edible wildlife in the area, as well as the options to either cure or cook them.

Well, in that case, problem solved. All he needed now was a fish.

Hosting himself down through the hatch, Kaisa took a quick look around him and immediately made a beeline for the nearest peeper. However, they turned out to be surprisingly agile, slipping straight out of his hands and leaping out of the water to land a half-meter away. This repeated itself several times until he eventually gave up, hunger pangs starting to gnaw away at his stomach. Looking downwards, he noticed a small sphere on the floor and after scanning it and seeing what it was, he managed a faint smile.

One freshly fabricated grav-trap later and Kaisa had managed to secure himself a good haul of around three peepers and a rather uncreatively named boomerang. He pulled himself into the lifepod and immediately busied himself with attempting to fit a still flopping peeper into the fabricator hatch.

He eventually managed and after confirming his option to cook the fish, took it upon himself to watch the little fabrication lasers flick to and fro, building up layer upon layer of meat and eye jelly in a matter up seconds until a fully cooked peeper sat on the fabrication platform in from of him.

He didn't have any cutlery, so Kaisa promptly pulled off a piece of the fin and took a tentative bite out of it. It was slightly salty, and a bit too rich for his liking, but it was good, and the fabricator had kept true to its word and removed the skeleton. At least it was fresh, immediately placing it above the various dehydrated "foods" sold on the Aurora.

Being as hungry as he was, Kaisa finished the peeper in mere minutes after confirming the eye was almost tasteless and throwing away the beak. He'd always been a fan of the traditional seafood taken from Earth, so this wasn't exactly a massive leap. Still, it was just a bit unnerving having that dead fish eye just staring at him as it got pulled apart.

His food at a healthy 103% and the other two peepers polished off, Kaisa turned his attention to water. His fabricator stated that he could use something called a bladderfish to filter out some water, but there was no way in hell he was drinking something that had been squeezed through a dead fish. Alternatively, bits of the giant coral tubes could be used with salt to make bleach which, in turn, could purify the water.

Kaisa chose this path, grabbing his knife from the locker and pulling the hatch open. But just before he could dive in, the PDA said in its usual flat voice, "Warning. Local radiation readings suggest the Aurora's drive core has reached critical state. Quantum detonation will occur within two hours."

Kaisa had ignored the first two warnings he'd gotten of this nature, mostly because one came through whilst he was lying on the floor, and the other when he was at lifepod 3. However, this warning seemed more severe, giving a clear period of time and the result. He didn't know what most of the techno-babble meant; he was an electronics engineer, not a quantum drive mechanic. What he did recognise was one of the last words, known to Alterra employees across the galaxy.

Detonation.

* * *

Xelicic was still unable to fully process what he had seen. Although it had crossed his mind when evacuating the biome, he'd pushed it to the back of his head and tried to ignore it. After all, it could have...

It might have...

He didn't know what he was hoping for, but he was hoping for something. Anything. Anything but this.

Melatisma stared at him through sad, dilated pupils. "But what can we do now?"

"The best we can do is leave it behind. I think we've got far more pressing matters to deal with right now," Xelicic said, pointing at the crashed, burning husk of a space-swimmer with a blade.

She shook a tentacle in affirmation. "Right."

* * *

Okay… so what next. Kaisa had food and water sorted, as well as a two hour window before he'd have to get as far away from the Aurora as possible. Pulling up his PDA, he flicked to the survival checklist in his data bank, scanning through until he came to what should be the next part of the list.

He'd only had a good look at it after he'd gotten back from lifepod 3, so the order he'd done things was a bit sporadic. From what he could tell, he should 'survey the environment for threats and resources'. Although he'd partially done this already, he did need to find more of those fragments to reacquire those blueprints. But first, he'd need more oxygen, and a high capacity tank would definitely help.

To make it, he'd need two sheets of glass and 200 grams of silver, as well as around another 50 grams of titanium. Rifling through the lifepod storage, Kaisa was surprised to not only find the four pieces of quartz he needed for the glass but a fist-sized piece of titanium he'd found after breaking open one of the crumbly limestone outcrops that measured to be around the amount he needed.

Pulling the hatch open once again, Kaisa set out in search of silver. It was meant to be found in sandstone, but they had turned out to be few and far between, and it was taking him a lot longer than expected.

Most outcrops weak enough for him to break yielded nothing but lead and gold, which although useful, wasn't what he was looking for. This wasn't helped by the lack of oxygen, because as alluring as the sandstone outcrops at the bottom of the kelp forest were, he didn't want to take that risk.

After around half an hour of searching and a close call with an adventurous stalker, Kaisa had traded in his oxygen tank for a new one, able to hold around an hour's worth of air. Now to find those fragments.

* * *

Before leaving the lifepod, Kaisa quickly went over the things he needed to bring for his trip. It was his first time going outside for a prolonged amount of time in the two days he'd been there, and he wasn't planning on dying on his first try.

Food (two cured peepers), flashlight, knife, disinfected water and a spare battery. Hopefully, that'd be all he would need. After all, it was just a small excursion to get a few blueprints. Perhaps he was being overly cautious?

Well, it's better safe than sorry, Kaisa reasoned as he slipped into the water. Diving to the sea floor, he decided to go and check the wreckage down by the far side of the 'safe shallows', as his PDA called it. Among the wreckage, he not only found two fragments needed for a beacon, but a piece of wreckage as well. According to his PDA, it could be deconstructed into 400 grams of titanium, making it a far more efficient way of getting titanium than hitting rocks.

Swimming away from the wreckage revealed another beneath a drop. This one was more of the same, as well as another piece for the 'seaglide' that he found back at lifepod 3, bringing his count up to one piece remaining. And in the distance was another. Following the trail of broken metal and taking the occasional break to eat a peeper, Kaisa paid no heed to the direction in which it was taking him until he noticed how murky the water was. Feeling disorientated, he surfaced to check how close he was to the Aurora.

It

Was

Right

There

The metal carcass loomed around twenty meters in front of him. Kaisa frantically pulled out his PDA and checked the on-board clock for the estimated time of detonation.

Twenty minutes. If he left now, he should be able to get away from the blast before the drive core vaporised him. Plunging back under, a tremor from the Aurora shook the water and murk into frenzy, but Kaisa didn't have time to waste waiting for the water to settle. He started in the direction of the life pod, but was quickly stopped by a wall of metal in front of him.

His blood turned cold. Resurfacing, he quickly realised that the tremor must've set him off in the wrong direction, and he was now touching the shell of plasteel that made up the Aurora's hull.

Dipping back under, he found that the water had settled enough to see normally again, so there was no way he'd lose his sense of direction this time. However, as he was turning around to leave, something caught his eye that the murk had been hiding. Something purple.

In a rare moment of silence following the sound of metal breaking within the Aurora, he could hear a faint mix of clicks and grating sounds.

Kaisa spun round to face the purple, which quickly made itself out to be two creatures, although he wasn't able to make out many details.

Then one of them disappeared.

Scrambling back through the water in panic, Kaisa watched the other one vanish from his sight as well.

Only to appear dead in front of him.

He and the creature locked eyes, his wide with fear and it's staring at him curiously. It released a loud grating sound, moved one of the scythes on its arms upwards, and Kaisa screamed.

* * *

 **Feel free to leave a review. They all help!**


End file.
